Air April 6, 2005

Thank you Jerry, and good morning everyone. April rolled in and everyone got the burning fever. Think we need to talk about that a few minutes this morning!

It seems that a whole bunch of people wanted to do some burning this weekend and that caused some conflict with the weather. I was coming back from Kansas City on Sunday night and I was quite surprised at how much smoke was in the air from fires on Sunday. Why this surprised me was because I considered it quite windy to be burning. Yes, I know that we haven't had good burning conditions for several years, but folks, we're just really moving into the front end of the burning season. We probably still have a 2 to 3 weeks to get this burning done. We don't HAVE to do it the first of April. For brush control and to maintain a good warm season grass stand and to minimize encroachment by fescue, bluegrass and bromegrass, burning later in April would be far preferable! Let's review a couple of things this morning. As I said, we have plenty of time yet to burn. And gosh, if it turns off wet from now til May, then maybe we'll just have to wait until next year! Remember, agricultural open burning is permitted under specific conditions by the state of Kansas and locally by Geary County statutes as well. These state and county regulations aren't there to make your life miserable, they are there to protect you, your right to burn and everyone's property and safety. Kansas statutes are VERY specific about weather conditions and burning with wind speeds over 15 mph are simply something not to be done. Even if you get your fire finished before the wind comes up at mid-day, you and I both know that even after the main fire is out, there are still hot spots everywhere. You've got old tree stumps that smolder for a long time. You've got dry cow patties that will burn into next week, or so it seems. And get these smoldering remnents tied up with winds switching directions and kicking up to 30 mph or higher, and you've got firefighters running everywhere trying to catch up. The EPA is really starting to watch what we do in the Flint Hills very very carefully. And yes, they could take our right to burn away regardless of whether it makes sense or not. It's happened in other states. So let's be calm, cool and careful with these burns, and if you're interested in being a rural volunteer fireman, give me a call, we could always use a couple dozen more!

This is Chuck Otte, Geary County Extension Agent, with Ag Outlook 2005.

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